It’s barren, it’s beautiful and its very name, Connemara, conjures images of romance. In Dublin, before leaving for western Ireland with my tour guide Irwin Johnston, more than one Irishman assured me of its attractions with “Ah, to be sure, Connemara, now that’s the place of dreams.”

Roundstone, a delightful little seaside village with a sheltered harbour and fishing boats rocking at anchor was our first stop. Lunching on fresh salmon and wine at O’Dowd’s Pub, we readied ourselves for an afternoon of exploration.

Strolling through the village we came upon candy-coloured cottages flanking a tranquil ocean. A B&B called ‘Wits End’ attracted my attention, not just for its rich salmon pink walls, but its curious name. On seeing it, my journalist’s mind went into overdrive. Wits End...was there a story there I wondered? Below the road lobster pots littered the stone jetty. Currachs, traditional Irish fishing boats, lay scattered on the shore and all around us the sea air carried its own distinctive aroma.

Close to the edge of the village, Malachy Kearns, the world’s premier bodhran maker handcrafts celtic drums for Ireland’s musicians. Traced back as an instrument used in Roman times, the drum’s haunting sound accompanies the famous Riverdancers and for an entirely different purpose, the bodhran is also used as a source of intimidation by football fans at international football matches.

Quite unlike what I had imagined, Connemara’s landscape was not flat, and to my eyes certainly not barren. The saturated colours of its tall emerald grasses tossing in the wind and the murky tea-coloured water of Connemara’s bogs emphasized its full natural beauty. It was winter and earthy tones dominated. Heather and bracken coloured the landscape in mauves and varying shades of rust. Clouds draped their ever-changing shapes on hilltops. There were valleys, lakes and white washed cottages. Alongside the road, fields partitioned off into small enclosed sections by rough stone walls, acted as containments for sheep. Where the sea washed against the shore, white coral beaches like undulating snowy ribbons separated sea from land. The coral sand was rough, abrasive on bare feet.

Rain in its various intensities is a fact of life in Ireland. Under a lowering sky and a gentle drizzle we drove along a narrow road raised about eight inches above the bog, to reach the place where two Englishmen, John Alcock and Arthur Whitten Brown, landed after the world’s first transatlantic flight in June 1919.

On a 2,000 kilometre journey from Newfoundland to Ireland, Brown climbed out onto the plane’s wings over the Atlantic Ocean on four occasions to clear the ice from the engines. Buoyed by a bottle of whiskey, the two drank ostensibly to keep warm. On their perilous flight they managed to survive three more close encounters with death. The plane at one point went into a death spiral and then a nose dive. On each occasion it righted itself just above the sea. And then when heading for the Marconi Tower on the Ireland approach they saw what appeared to be an ideal landing place. Down they came and the plane tipped nose first into the squelchy waters of Derrygimlach Bog.

The further we drove in search of Alcock and Brown’s landing site, the harder it rained. It was getting dark and and at that time if I had known about Connemara’s mysterious, and by all accounts gigantic horse-eels, said to make their appearances after sunset, I would have been out of there like a shot. At the point when Irwin decided that we could go no further, I breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

In Connemara I was to experience life at both ends of the spectrum. At Dan O’Hara’s Heritage Centre, Martin Walsh accompanied us to a rustic dwelling on a hill. He described how the large O’Hara family was raised in this simple dwelling. “Daughters had their own place on a shelf close to the roof” he told us. After many marriages the last remaining daughter was said to be ‘left on the shelf’”.

Sitting on a stool in a pool of sunlight beside a warming fire, Walsh with a pleasing baritone, sang that melancholy song so cherished by the Irish.

If you ever go across the sea to Ireland then maybe at the closing of your day you can sit and watch the moon rise over Claddagh and see the sun go down on Galway Bay.

Life with all its dramas was lived in this tiny space, no larger than a modern Canadian kitchen. In his own words Walsh described how in 1840 “this room became a ballroom of romance. Assignations, matchmaking and weddings all took place here”.

At the other end of the spectrum I spent a night in Ballynahinch Castle. Set in the wild and lonely lands of Connemara, this place is a haven of enchantment. We arrived as a shooting party was returning from a days hunt for woodcock. Irish country gentlemen clad in traditional shooting apparell – knickerbockers, long woollen socks, sage green tweed jackets and flat caps mingled in noisy camraderie at the castle’s entrance.

Far from the chilly atmosphere of a crenelated and turreted medieval fortification, Ballynahinch Castle was more like a comfortable if grand country manor house. Its public rooms were large, graciously furnished, each with a crackling fire in an ornamental marble fireplace. Its bedchambers were equally old-world. Mine, as I sat writing my journal on a comfy tapestry sofa facing the garden, was wallpapered; caramel with pink roses. Heavy velvet curtains framed the scene beyond. The four poster bed standing in grand splendour was the piece de resistance. It was big enough to accommodate a family of four.

As evening drew in I felt an unexplained chill. The thought crossed my mind, “Ghosts, I wonder if there are ghosts here”. After rising at 2a.m. and pulling back the drapes, I saw no ghosts, but a sky splashed with a multitude of stars. The following morning when chatting with Patrick O’Flaherty, the castle’s general manager, I asked if they’d ever encountered ghosts in the castle. “Funny you should ask” he said. “Morby, the one-time gardener, is known to put in an appearance now and then.”

There was a time when Ballynahinch was owned by an Indian prince and even earlier than that by a man called Richard Martin. As a parliamentarian Martin was responsible for a law guaranteeing ‘the rights of animals’ and for that he was known as ‘Humanity Dick’. At the time Martin was the largest landowner in the British Isles. When the length of a landowner’s driveway was an indication of his status, Martin challenged his friend King George 1V with “I bet you my driveway is longer than yours”. And he was right. His driveway stretched for 41 miles from the ancient city of Galway to Ballynahinch.

Illicit it may be, but I was eager to taste homemade Irish whiskey known in these parts as poteen. Invited to partake of a toast to Ireland by a genial Irishman we met along the way, I was not ready to refuse! The bottle containing 70% alcohol was duly extracted from a hidey hole and my guide and I were each offered a tipple. “Not I” said my guide. “I’m driving.” “Well that leaves me” I said, and held out my glass. Holding my glass aloft, three quarters full of that potent liquor, I recited the toast as instructed. “Now it must all go down in one gulp” I was told. So down, down, down it went, leaving me who seldom imbibes, gasping.

Ireland’s invitation to the 2013 Gathering, the largest event the country has ever hosted, has gone out to all 70 million people of Irish descent around the world. I accepted the invitation and soon discovered that this green and glorious country is indeed a place of dreams.

------------------

Guide Recommendation:

I travelled Ireland from Dublin to Connemara with Irwin Johnston, a tour guide of many years standing. If your plans include a guide with a car, or even a tour bus for a large group, Irwin Johnston, accredited by Failte Ireland, is the man. Email: johnstons@eircom.net

For The 2013 Gathering’s Festivals and Events and information about Ireland:

Visit www.thegatheringireland.com and www.Ireland.com

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Whisky, warm welcomes await in Ireland

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